


command me to be well

by neverfadingrain



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Alternate Universe - His Dark Materials, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-03
Updated: 2015-07-03
Packaged: 2018-04-07 10:55:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4260669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neverfadingrain/pseuds/neverfadingrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>daredevil + daemons. a series of moments.</p>
            </blockquote>





	command me to be well

**Author's Note:**

> Soooo this is my first daemon fic! Hurrah! S2G, I thought the first one I posted was gonna be my monster Musketeers daemon au, but that fic decided to be stubborn and then I watched Daredevil again and. Also Kate was a dear and wanted to talk about daemons so I said here, how about I write you some? Notes on forms and names, as always, in the bottom notes!

_command me to be well_

 

 

 

 **1\. His Josephina settles and it’s like the blow of the hammer all over again, in the quiet moment immediately after he’s pulled back from the edge.** She makes a dismayed noise, sharp and rattling, and Wilson looks over the dead body at her instinctively.

For a second, he doesn’t recognize her—for a second, he thinks his father’s Tahlia has miraculously survived. Then he sees the gold Dust scattered liberally across her wings, recognizes her beady amber eyes and the shift of her talons against the hardwood floor. _What does it mean?_ Josephina asks anxiously. _Wilson, I can’t change—I’m stuck._

The word vibrates through him with a heavy frequency. It’s something they’d been looking forward to, an affirmation of everything his father had been telling them for years. “Bein’ settled s’a sign of manhood,” his father had rambled, his Tahlia perched regally on the back of his chair and watching over the dinner table with piercing eyes. “Means you’re old enough to handle things around the house when I’m gone. Means you can do what you want, and ain’t no one allowed to tell you otherwise.”

Now, though. Wilson hadn’t ever thought his Josephina would settle as a bird—especially not as an eerie mimicry of Tahlia, a perfect match down to the banded stripes on her talons and the tufts of feathers on the back of her head. But when he’d seen his father going after his mom, well; something had shifted between them, a nameless emotion, and Josephina had flown forward without thought, just growing and _growing_ until she couldn’t grow any bigger. And now she’s settled, stuck in the same shape that’s haunted their nightmares for years.

The anger slithers between them like a current, unrelenting and full of hidden danger.

“Wilson,” his mom says, quiet and resolute. What’s done is done, she’s said before, and he sees the sentiment reflected in her now. “Help me with this.”

They wrap up the body calmly, methodically. His mom’s Elior helps, dexterous squirrel paws of more use than Josephina’s enormous wings, and then they move it into the garage piece by piece. His mom cuts them a piece of zuppa to share afterwards, and then they go to bed like nothing’s wrong. Nobody mentions how [Josephina](http://www.pauldonahue.net/Images/artwork/harpy_eagle_2.jpg) casts the same shadow across the kitchen floor as Tahlia used to, but it hangs over them all nonetheless.

 

 

 

**2\. They honestly don’t think she’s got the guts to pull the trigger. Right up until she does.**

He gasps, pain flooding his senses, hand instinctively coming up to hover over the wound. There’s a fine golden shimmer in the corner of his eye, rippling in the light as his Angie lunges for the girl’s mongoose. He’s seen that shimmer before; he dreads what it means.

Bang. Two, three.

His body shivers with the pain. An answering echo shudders through Angie like an explosion. Maybe that’s what it is. Golden Dust bleeds from her silky fur, cutting distressed patterns through the air as she fights with the other daemon.

The girl stares at him, steely-eyed, gun shaking ever so slightly in her grip. She hadn’t been lying—it’s not her first time shooting someone. He should’ve brought backup; it seems he’s underestimated Karen Page.

Bang. Four, five. Six.

There’s a bitter taste welling up in his mouth. Coppery, mixed with a tinge of old dust and abandoned warehouse. Angie breaks off from her fight and limps back to his side, leaps unsteadily into his lap and noses her way under his lax hand. _Wesley,_ she whines lowly. _Don’t leave._

 _Don’t think I have a choice, dearheart._ He chokes a little on the words. The girl’s still watching him.

[Angela](http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/seekers/images/0/0c/ArcticFox.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120723205201) trembles. His hands are coated with a combination of her Dust and his own blood. The swirl of color looks almost…poetic under the naked bulb light. _We made a promise,_ she insists tremulously, _and we have to keep it. We can’t leave him._

_I don’t want to._

His fingers twitch, and Angie presses back against him. Gold surrounds them, now; she’s dissolving more and more the longer he looks at her. It breaks his heart, or what’s left of it. What a powerful man with an eagle soul hasn’t yet claimed. Wesley thinks of sunlight shining through silvery white feathers, remembers how gentle ferocious-looking talons had been when they’d grasped his Angie and lifted her back to his side, recalls the feeling of that sharp hooked beak carding delicately through her fur.

He’d touched those great white wings, just once, a lifetime ago. In comparison, Angie had been held and petted by the other almost…frequently. It had felt good; been a mark of trust, of faith, of devotion. Wesley breathes out once more, a last ragged gasp, and wishes he had been able to say goodbye.

 

 

 

 **3\. She’s not sure what makes her decide to trust the lawyers.** It isn’t the matching pair of innocent grins on their faces as they sit down across from her—and how do they do that, anyways—and it sure as fuck isn’t the way they came marching into her interrogation room like they had all the answers, like there was no doubt in their minds that they were going to get her out of here.

Under the table, her Malakai touches tentative noses with first the blind man’s bobcat daemon and then the other man’s…raccoon. She thinks. It looks like a raccoon. Sort of.

[Malakai](http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c630a53ef011570d6d6b5970c-500wi) sneezes.

“Who the hell are you guys?” Karen asks. This day started off bad and just keeps getting weirder.

The blind one smiles at her. It’s a nice smile, practiced, charming. “I’m Matt, he’s Foggy.”

 _They don’t smell bad. Not like the cops who locked us in here,_ Malakai inputs from under her chair, coarse fur brushing against the skin of her ankle reassuringly. _And their daemons are nice._

 _You think we should trust them?_ Karen isn’t exactly ready to trust anyone right now, not after waking up to a pool of her friend’s blood coating her carpet, but if Malakai says it’s alright…

 _I think,_ he says carefully, and pauses. _I think we have exactly one chance of getting out of here, and they just walked through the door._

Karen takes a deep breath. Then she takes a leap of faith.

Luckily, Matt and Foggy are there to catch her before she hits the bottom.

 

 

 

**4\. Her Iosias starts fluttering his wings agitatedly the closer they get to her apartment, and that’s how she knows that the masked man has stumbled, bleeding, back into her life.**

Damnit. She’d hoped that the recent run of stitching up a whackjob blind vigilante had been enough to earn her a cosmic break for a while. Guess not.

Iosias resettles his perch on her shoulder when Claire comes to a stop in front of their door, fishing her keys out of her purse and praying that she can actually get the lock open. It likes to stick, sometimes, and— _What are they doing here,_ Iosias hisses, uncharacteristically grouchy.

Claire jostles her shoulder, making him squawk at her. _We memorized their phone number, remember? That’s like, tacit approval to come and go as they please._

Her front door creaks open, stubbornly noisy, and Claire peers into the shadowed interior for a moment before stepping inside. There’s an answering creak from the direction of the couch, and she hurries to flick the light switches on. [Iosias](http://topbirdsandeveryfing.typepad.com/.a/6a0120a571835d970c0163021ad60d970d-pi) curses under his breath, then launches himself from her shoulder and disappears into the swathes of drapes surrounding her lone window.

A blur of golden-red fur and black spots dislodges from the couch with a growl and what is, unmistakably, an ‘ _I got him here, he’s your problem now’_ sort of look from the masked man’s daemon. Claire still doesn’t know her name, but she knows the bobcat’s voice—a smooth velvety alto, with just a burr of a growl riding the underside. A fitting daemon for the devil of Hell’s Kitchen. She stalks in the direction of the window, following Iosais with her eyes, and something unspoken passes between the two daemons because Iosias _hisses_ but flutters to meet her on the ground.

Claire turns her attention to the man in the mask—to _Matt_ —who smiles sheepishly up at her around a face full of blooming bruises. “Hi,” he says. “Fancy meeting you here.”

For all of thirty seconds, she considers lecturing him to within an inch of his life. It’s fast becoming a familiar urge. Then she breathes through it, forces herself to calm. She’s a nurse, she doesn’t hurt the people who come to her for help. No matter how tempting it is sometimes. “Hello, Matt. Who did you beat up this time?”

“Oh, nobody special. Just a couple of Russian thugs.” Matt tries to shrug, but quickly aborts with a wince. Must have damaged his ribs again.

Claire rolls her eyes at him, but dutifully moves to retrieve the first aid kit.

 

 

 

 **5\. Sometimes people tell him his daemon settled in the wrong shape.** A bloodhound would’ve been more fitting, they say, or maybe a badger. Stubborn and doggedly pursuing the truth. A bright bird, they tell him, is the last shape that should fit his soul.

When Ben first meets Doris, she takes one look at his [Hypatia](http://www.tanzania.co.tz/Content/Pictures/woodland%20kingfisher%20perched%20on%20a%20branch%20birdwatching%20in%20tanzania%20africa%20lake%20manyara.jpg) and coos. “Oh, she’s beautiful. Just like you.”

Doris’ own [Elias](http://www.larkwire.com/static/content/images/ipad/LBNA1/RufousHummingbird.jpg) is a jittery little hummingbird who zips in dizzying circles around them as they talk. Doris is nervous, all of the potential informants he meets with are, but there’s a hidden steel to her expression that tells Ben this one is different.

A year later, when he’s standing next to the priest watching Doris practically float down the aisle, her Elias zooming ecstatically back and forth between them, the thought comes to him again. Hypatia nips his ear reprovingly. _Eyes forward, Romeo. On the future, where they belong._

 _Our future,_ Ben says giddily.

She’s rolling her eyes at him, Ben can tell. But she doesn’t say anything; when Doris draws level with him at the altar, Hypatia launches herself into the air to join Elias. Most of the priest’s words are a blur to him—Ben will remember later stumbling over the “I do’s” and being unable to stop beaming ecstatically—but he takes notice when the man draws himself up.

“With the power vested in me,” he intones, “I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss your bride.”

Ben turns to Doris, her smile beatific, and takes her face in his hands. The kiss feels like their first one. A fresh start, a new beginning. Elias clips Ben’s ear as he zips past, and Hypatia makes pleased little chirruping noises deep in her throat. _Our future,_ she repeats.

 

 

 

 **6\. Getting in the helicopter is one of the hardest decisions she’s ever made.** Harder than the decision to give Wilson the benefit of the doubt, harder even than when she was trying to figure out where to go to art school. But in the end, like usual, Wilson gives her a choice that is no choice at all.

Vanessa waits on that rooftop for what feels like a lifetime, twisting the delicate circle of metal in her fingers, bracing herself against the fierce winds kicked up by the whirling blades. And waits and waits, until Wilson’s bodyguards are all checking their watches and glancing at her nervously.

[Dante’s](http://www.nps.gov/common/uploads/teachers/assets/images/akr/park/chat/8A33FA28-1DD8-B71C-07E697AD4D274811/8A33FA28-1DD8-B71C-07E697AD4D274811.jpg) tucked himself in the hollow of her throat, an iridescent shimmer of color against her tanned skin. It’s both to keep himself protected from the gusts of wind and to comfort her after Wilson’s abrupt departure. It’s not enough. It won’t be enough, not until she sees Wilson step out of that doorway, his Josephina casting an intimidating shadow from her perch on his shoulder.

She shivers, half turns back to the chopper. “We need to go, ma’am,” the bodyguards tell her.

 _He promised,_ Dante whispers against her skin. _He promised he would come back to us._

 _He said it might not be tonight. And we can’t wait forever,_ Vanessa reminds her daemon, the words catching in her throat.

His wings beat tiny drums against her collarbones, rapid and delicate. _We_ won’t _wait forever. If he takes too long, we’ll just have to go hunt him down ourselves._

Vanessa hums an agreement, slides Wilson’s ring onto her finger, and steps into the helicopter of her own volition. It doesn’t make her heart hurt any less as they soar above the streets, above the chaos, but she comforts herself with the knowledge that if she has to, she will rip this city apart to get her fiancé back.

 

 

 

 **7\. He stares at Matt’s unconscious body, Liana curled into a furry ball on top of his bruised shins, and wonders how he could’ve possibly been so fucking stupid.** In hindsight, all the clues are so obvious, it’s like Matt deliberately left a breadcrumb trail for him to follow to the truth.

The papers call him the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen because there isn’t a daemon at his side. In all the pictures that have been taken of the man in the mask, all the grainy security footage pulled, no one has found the slightest indication that he has a daemon.

And Foggy _knows_ Matt and Liana can separate, can put ridiculous distances between themselves and not feel a thing. There was that one time in college, when Matt’s senses had completely overwhelmed him and Liana had left him outside the library to get help. To get Foggy, who’d been over halfway across campus and in class but still dropped everything to come retrieve Matt.

 _And_ Liana has taken to spending most of her nights at Foggy’s apartment recently, huddled into the corner of his couch with Foggy’s own daemon, whimpering through terrible dreams the whole time while Matt is…nowhere to be found. And not answering his phone.

In hindsight, Foggy thinks, it’s a miracle he didn’t figure it out sooner.

His [Roxanne](https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8373/8371826251_c2523132ba_o.jpg) nudges him. She’s sitting in between his feet, lanky body framed on either side by his legs. It’s a spot she only chooses when she’s feeling particularly uncomfortable about a situation. Or when she’s keeping a secret from Foggy and feels guilty about it. _It’s not your fault,_ Roxy says now, looking up at him. Her eyes are very dark, conveying a rare sort of seriousness. _They didn’t want you to know_.

 _You knew,_ Foggy says, choking up. He won’t cry. He will not.

Roxy thumps her tail into his ankle as hard as she can. _Wasn’t my secret to tell. You would’ve gotten mad at me for it, after you calmed down._

As hard as it is to admit, she has a point.

 _Of course I do,_ Roxy says smugly, and Foggy nudges her with the tip of his shoe.

“Shush, you,” he grumbles aloud, and watches the resulting crease of surprise and pain in Matt’s slack face. He’s unconscious, he’s not supposed to respond to random stimuli right now. Hottie McBurner Phone had as good as confirmed that for him. Score one for Team Nelson right now.

Roxy very sneakily—and very deliberately—unties the laces of his shoes in response.

 

 

 **8\. People often assume that his daemon settled during the car accident that took his sight.** Nine is early to settle, but that sort of traumatic incident is usually the exception to the rule.

And, in their defense, Matt’s Emiliana thinks it’s hilarious to remain in the form of a bat for a good few years after the accident. So hilarious, in fact, that it’s the only shape she wears in public until Jack Murdock is found dead in an alley behind the gym he trains at daily.

Liana _howls_ when they find out, an unearthly haunting sound, and darts down the alley faster than Matt can keep up. He gets held up by policemen, too—the bond between them stretches, like a taught string, until it _hurts_ —but Matt’s small, and more importantly he’s fast, and he ducks past the cops and follows the tug to where Liana’s hovering over his dad’s prone body.

 _It’s him,_ she says, choked up, but Matt already knows that. He doesn’t need his daemon’s eyes to confirm what his heart’s telling him.

Gunpowder and blood are thick in the air, clogging Matt’s senses with their stench. They’re so powerful that he almost doesn’t catch the fading familiar scents of his dad’s Lucia. His stomach rolls. It doesn’t take a sighted person to see what’s happened here. Jack Murdock was, undoubtedly, murdered.

His Liana makes a keening noise, one that changes pitches in the middle, and the air ripples with the force of her changing shape. There’s a weight, then, that seeps into his bones like the warmth of the sun, and Matt gasps. “Liana, what—?”

They’re settled.

Matt knows it like he knows how to breathe; Liana doesn’t even need to say anything.

“What?” he asks again, a totally different question in the word. God, he’s pathetic. He doesn’t even know the shape of his own soul.

Liana purrs, a soothingly low rumbling, and the padding of her footsteps is nearly soundless. Her fur brushes his arm, thick and warm; the lub-dub of her heart is fast. Feline. Matt runs trembling fingers over her head, the sharp plane of her face, down her arched back to the stub of a tail. Slowly, an image forms in his mind of what she must look like now.

It’s shockingly familiar to what he remembers of his father’s Lucia.

“A bobcat,” he says faintly. Liana purrs again in agreement.

Bobcats are hunting animals. More importantly, bobcats are _fighting_ animals. And his dad had made him promise that he wouldn’t fight. Ever.

“Are you sure?” Matt asks, like it isn’t already done and decided. Like he could make Liana change now even if he wanted to. She’s _his_ , and he’s _hers,_ and that’s the way things are.

[Emiliana](http://usercontent2.hubimg.com/8578571_f496.jpg) grumbles at him, grumbles some more at the echoing cops' footsteps that follow them down the alley. _What d’you mean, am I sure? Of course I’m sure. We’re Murdocks, aren’t we? We’re meant to fight._

**Author's Note:**

> Daemons:
> 
> Matt: Emiliana, to strive or excel; rival. Also named after St. Jerome Emiliani, the Patron Saint of Orphans. Spanish. Bobcat. 
> 
> Foggy: Roxanne, dawn. English. Raccoon dog, alternately referred to as a tanuki. Form of a Japanese trickster god.
> 
> Karen: Malakai, my messenger. Hebrew. Yellow Mongoose.
> 
> Claire: Iosias, whom Jehovah heals. Hebrew. Barbary Dove.
> 
> Ben: Hypatia, supreme woman, Greek. Woodland Kingfisher.
> 
> Wilson: Josephina, God raises. Hebrew. Harpy Eagle
> 
> Wesley: Angela, messenger of God. Latin/Greek. Arctic Fox.
> 
> Vanessa: Dante, enduring. Italian. Not so secretly a reference to The Divine Comedy. Blue Fronted Dancer Damselfly.


End file.
